2009 New Jersey Gubernatorial debate

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New Jersey's Union Mason Recontractors Sun National Bank New Jersey Carpenter Contractor Trust U.S. Screen Building Council, New Jersey Chapter and by New Jersey Manufacturers Insurance Company. This program is co-sponsored by the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Genet New Jersey Newspaper Group, and NJN New Jersey Public Television. Good evening, I'm Jim Hooker.

Welcome to NJN's campaign 2009 New Jersey gubernatorial debate. For the next 90 minutes, we'll hear from the two major party candidates and an independent running for governor. They are, incumbent Democratic Governor John Corazon, Republican Chris Christie, the former U.S. Attorney, and independent Chris Daggett, a former EPA Regional Administrator and State DEP Commissioner. Welcome to you gentlemen. Tonight's exchange is one of just two forums required by the State Election Law Enforcement Commission under the public financing laws. Two of the candidates, Mr. Christie and Mr. Daggett, are drawing public matching funds. In tonight's debate, the three candidates will be asked questions by a panel of reporters. They are, NJN new senior political correspondent Michael Aaron, Cynthia Burton of the Philadelphia Inquirer, and Bob Engel of Genet New Jersey. Later, we'll also have questions on tape gathered from the public in the field. But first, let's explain the format. The candidate who has asked a question will have one minute to answer his two opponents will then be given 30 seconds each to respond.

The candidate to whom the question was originally asked will then be given a 30-second rebuttal. The reporter who initially asked the question has the option for a follow-up that can be directed to any of the three candidates. That candidate will then have 30 seconds for a response. As moderator, I'll strictly enforce the time limits and the format. Michael Aaron has the first question, and it goes to Mr. Christie. Michael? Thank you, Jim. Mr. Christie, it sometimes seems your budget numbers don't add up. You say you would cut the income tax in your first term and end the corporate business tax surcharge. But you also say you would spend more on higher education, restore homestead rebates to some prior level, and you criticize John Coursine for underfunding the transportation trust fund, the state pension system, and for not compensating landowners in the Highlands. And you also talk about an $8 billion deficit heading into next year. Where is the balance sheet on all this?

Michael, thank you for the question and thank you to all of you for watching tonight and for being here. Listen, there's a clear distinction here between me and my two opponents in this race. Over the past two weeks, each of them has made clear that in the second term for Mr. Coursine, or in the first term for Mr. Daggett, they will raise taxes. And I will simply not do that. What we will do, Michael, is very simple. We will get down to Trenton and we will get into that budget and we will work cooperatively with the legislature and we'll make sure that we bring the budget down and we cut it back significantly. If you look at the last eight years, if the budgets over the last eight years have been kept to just the rate of inflation, we would have taxed and spent $35 billion less and this year's budget alone would have been $5.2 billion less. And so the fact is, people in Trenton tell you all the time you can't do this. Same way they told me that I couldn't fight corruption when I was U.S. Attorney. I didn't believe it then and I don't believe it when I get to Trenton. This Governor Coursine, you have 30 seconds for a response. Thank you. Good evening, everyone.

Let me first of all compliment Mr. Daggett because he has a plan. I have a record in a plan and Mr. Christie has no plan. It's a fantasy as identified by the Star Ledger. We've cut the budget this year for the second year in a row. The first time at 60 years of budget has been cut, over 12%. And making tough decisions in a tough environment is what being a governor is about. No plan is not what being a governor is about. Mr. Daggett, 30 seconds for your response. I agree that there's been no plan put forward by Mr. Christie. I've put forward a plan that cuts property taxes by 25% across the board. It cuts small business and corporate taxes by the same amount, 25% across the board. And most importantly, it balances the whole tax system out so that it's a fairer system and it makes New Jersey more competitive. And it makes New Jersey more affordable than it has been for years. Mr. Christie, 30 seconds for your rebuttal.

A governor course on does have a plan, the same plan for the next four years that he had for the last four. Which is to raise taxes $9 billion as he did in the last four years and still leave us with deficits. Mr. Daggett's plan is to raise taxes $4 billion. He didn't mention that in his answer. The fact of the matter is we are the highest tax burden state in America. And the people of New Jersey are suffocating under this tax burden and we can no longer have it. And so tough decisions do have to be made. But taking away property tax relief from people in the middle of a recession is a wrong decision, not a tough decision. Thank you, Mr. Christie. Michael Aaron has a follow-up. Mr. Christie, you're still being pretty vague on how tax cuts and certain spending hikes would mesh with an $8 billion deficit. Michael, listen, I understand you've been down here in Trenton a long time and you think that's vague because you don't understand that what leadership can do when you get into a state capital like Trenton is to say we're going to do things entirely differently. We are going to reduce spending. We just said, if we had just kept it at the rate of inflation, forget cutting just the rate of inflation. The people of New Jersey would have been taxed $35 billion less over the last eight years.

There's a lot to be done and we will do it. Our next question comes from Cynthia Burton of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Cynthia. Governor Corzion, the prize for winning this election is that you get to walk into the state house and immediately deal with a looming $8 billion budget deficit. Can you please be very specific with us about how you'll close the gap? Will you cut services? Will you raise taxes and fees? Cynthia, first of all, we had to face a $7 billion budget deficit last year and we were able to come in on time under the previous year's budget by $4.5 billion. Those projections of about $8 billion don't take into account whether the economy is going to turn. They have very low projections with regard to revenues. They don't take into account what President Obama will be offering in a 30-month stimulus program, which when and my opponent, Mr. Christie, would reject many of those elements of aid, that will also help us make the way through. And we have been constantly reducing the size and scope of government. We're down about 8400 employees since I became governor because of a strict tiring freeze and early retirement.

We will take the steps that are necessary to meet our constitutional obligation. I've been specific. I have a record. What I think needs to be asked by the public is what is the program that Mr. Christie would suggest as Mr. Aaron asked? Mr. Daggett, your response. The proposal I put forward will, for tax cuts, will also deal with about a third of that $8 billion budget. The remaining part of that budget, I will freeze spending and I'm going to ask state employees and all government employees across the board, I will work with them because they need to think about putting more contribution into their pension and healthcare benefits as well as possibly take a round of a salary freeze or even possibly a salary cut. But that will be able to be done to save jobs and save their pensions and healthcare benefits. That's an important part of this. Thank you. Mr. Christie, 30 seconds for your response. The record is very clear on this. In Governor Korzai's first two years as governor, despite campaigning four years ago and saying he was going to scrub the budget in fine ways to reduce spending, he increased spending 20% in his first two years as governor.

That's what put us in the hole that we're in today was that excessive spending when he first became governor and he raised taxes, $9 billion and fees over the last four years. New Jersey can no longer afford that type of governance. We need to say no to that and we need to get tough and threatened. Governor Korzai, my last budget is exactly the same number as when I came into office, give or take $100 million. I will not, I'll tell you what I won't do is I won't put the burden on our children because we will fund education to make sure that our future is secure. I will make sure that we keep responsibly adding children to our health insurance roles and I will make sure that the most vulnerable are protected. We have to make sure that we don't turn our back on our future. That means we have to be tough about the kinds of things that Mr. Dackett was talking about, pensions and making sure that we have time governor funding for the public does have a follow-up. Governor, would you seek to break the no layoff deal that you have with state workers?

We have lowered the number of public employees, one of the largest in the country. We will continue to have a hard hiring freeze that will reduce the size. We have had a 7% wage give back by our public employees, furloughs, wage freezes, we have taken every step to make sure that we are controlling the cost of public employees. And we have set an example for local government around the state. The next question goes is from Bob Engelkin at New Jersey and it goes to Mr. Dackett, Bob. The transportation trust fund is running out of money. How do you propose that we finance road and bridge construction? The transportation trust fund is out of money and largely because over the last 25 years or so this was put in place during the K-d administration and it was put in place on a pay-as-you-go basis. You have dedicated taxes that go to that fund, you bar something against that and you pay it back over time as you are going forward.

A sort of a pay-as-you-go system. But what's happened is the Republicans and Democrats over the last number of years have borrowed so much money that starting next year all the taxes that are dedicated to this are going to have to be used to pay down the state debt or excuse me to pay down the debt associated with that borrowing. So we have a circumstance now where the trust fund is broken and it needs to be filled. So the only way we're going to be able to do that realistically is probably deal with it through additional gas taxes or possibly putting additional tolls on our roads or increasing the tolls because with an $8 billion budget gap it's going to be very difficult to do that. And we're going to have to step up and be honest about the issues that face us and be willing to take the tough decisions that make this state time operational again. Mr. Christie, your response. Thank you. Again, I agree with Mr. Dagon Park. The history of Republicans and Democrats over the last 25 years on this issue is not multiple. Christy Whitman came in and extended debt payments to 20 years. That was a mistake.

Governor Corzine came in and extended it to 30 years. That was an even bigger mistake. So here again for Mr. Dagon and from Governor Corzine is higher tolls, higher fees, higher taxes. The people of New Jersey are suffering. They are suffocating under these taxes. We can't do it. We should go as pay as you go on the transportation trust fund, current budget funds. Governor Corzine, response. We live in the most densely populated state in the nation. We need to make sure that our roads are secure, our bridges are secure. We need to work to make sure that we're expanding mass transit. And that's exactly what we have been doing over the last four years. Matter of fact, we have the single largest infrastructure investment program going on. We will have to sit with the legislature and decide among very unattractive alternatives how we get this transportation trust fund back in order. I think just turn your back on it as I heard Mr. Christie say if you want to satisfy the needs of the public. Mr. Daggett, rebuttal?

I'd say Mr. Christie, it's easy to criticize when you have no plan of your own. And the bottom line is that you can't do it with smoking mirrors. I'd like the tooth fairy to come also, but the tooth fairy is not going to come and solve this problem. We're going to have to step up and face the issues of this state squarely, honestly, openly and across the board. When we do that, we're going to be not competitive and we're going to have a difficult time doing the sorts of things we need to do to make New Jersey affordable and competitive once again. Thank you. Bob Engel has a follow-up. Mr. Daggett, how much would you raise the tax on a gallon of gasoline in New Jersey? I think we'd take a look at what our needs are from a transportation standpoint. The lowest gasoline tax in the country right now, so we are in a position where if we have to do it, and nobody wants to raise taxes, who wants to raise taxes? But we also have crumbling roads, crumbling bridges, and potholes in too many places. We've got to do something, and the only thing that we're going to be able to do is to probably do as I proposed, either raising taxes or increasing tolls.

The amount that we're going to have to do it is probably going to be determined as we get better handle on the numbers and then be able to analyze it carefully and come up with the right number. The next question comes from Cynthia Burton, the inquirer, and it's for Mr. Christie. Mr. Christie, you have suggested that healthy young people should be able to purchase bare bones and insurance policies, which could cut mandated programs like mandated tests rather like mammograms and prostate cancer screenings. What would you cut from the list of mandated coverages in New Jersey to save money? Cynthia, I wouldn't cut from the mandated coverages. What I'm saying is that right now we have 550,000 women in the same New Jersey who have no insurance at all. And what I proposed was a plan to say that for those people, individuals who are currently uninsured, we should get them some insurance that they can afford. And so what our plan is is to get more people insured that are insured today.

100,000 less people are insured in New Jersey today than were insured eight years ago. That's not good for the state budget. And most importantly, that's not good for the health of those people, nearly 1.4 million now in total, that are uninsured in the state of New Jersey. And so we should allow those people to be able to make choices so they can get some kind of insurance rather than continue to have no insurance at all. And I guess my opponents in this race are content with these folks having no insurance or having a government option only that will continue to increase taxes as we continue to hear from them each time now. More taxes. Time. Governor Corzine, your response? First of all, I want to say that I thank God that Mr. Christie's mother had a mammogram. I hope that all women in New Jersey have mammograms. I just want to make certain though that the issue isn't about whether mammograms are effective, the issue is about whether insurance companies will actually pay for that or will they pay for maternity stays for 48 hours for women that give birth. The fact is the star ledger has said we've told the truth.

Mandates that come off of the insurance policies will end up giving the insurance companies the option of dropping mammograms, dropping 48 hours back for mature response. Mr. Christie's quote was, no cut of mandates doesn't support any cut of mandates. Well, if you don't cut the mandates, how are you going to reduce the premiums and make it affordable for people to have these policies? So somehow we're going to have to put together a plan that gives people a range of options. But in doing so, it may indeed make it so some of the mandated coverages aren't put in the policies. And that may not be all bad so that people have an option if they don't want certain coverages, let them elect not to have them, but you can't have no mandates and also reduce premiums. I don't get how you do it. Time. Mr. Christie, a rebuttal. So let's make it really clear. I would not have a plan that would ever prevent any woman who needed a mammogram to get one, the governor knows it. And this is just another example of his shameful campaign. It's a shameful campaign. It's an awful thing to have done. He knows it. And that's why today, for the first time, he said something nice in regard to that position because he knows that people are reacting awfully to that shameful ad.

He should pull it down and he should apologize. Thank you. The next question comes from Bob Engel for Governor Corzion. Bob. Governor, you told the Philadelphia inquire, you wouldn't rule out raising taxes. What taxes were you talking about? First of all, I want to just come back to the other issue that was just mentioned. I don't think it is shameful standing up for the women of the state of New Jersey to make sure that they have mandates, which are repeatedly stated in Mr. Christie's campaign literature and in his own voice, as recently as writer university with a cancer survivor who was struggling to have a debate with them about the issue. It is absolutely essential that we provide those mandates so that all women, everyone in the state of New Jersey can have those mammograms as a part of their insurance box. I'd rather stand with the women of New Jersey than I would with the insurance companies.

Now, I have, as I did the first time I ran for governor, will not take a no-tax pledge. It is the last resort. It is not taken off the table. You can't do that. You have a responsibility, constitutional responsibility, to balance the budget. And I don't intend to raise taxes, but the fact is you have to balance the budget. Mr. Daggett, your response? Isn't it appropriate that I'm in the middle of these two guys? Let's talk about the issues in this campaign, the issues that matter to the state of New Jersey. My plan does not raise taxes the way Mr. Christie is alleging. My plan balances and makes fairer in the taxes that's in place today. And in the end, it's going to make New Jersey more competitive and it's going to make New Jersey a lot more affordable than it is today, particularly for middle class homeowners who are going to get a 25% property tax cut. The last resort for me is to raise any taxes, but this is a tax balancing. It's not raising taxes overall. Mr. Christie, your response? The governor says he wants to stand with women, but first he'd like to scare them in order to get their vote and get reelected.

But on taxes, let's be clear, when the governor says he will not rule out raising taxes, and when he says it's the last resort, you know. And after watching the history of the last four years, that if John Corazon says it's the last resort, that's a resort he'll be checking into, and he'll be taking money out of people's pockets. And I will tell you something else about Chris Daggett, a $4 billion tax increase. He can color it however he wants to color it, but it is a $4 billion tax increase with the highest burden in America. We cannot continue with that. Governor Corazon rebuttal. The problem Mr. Christie has is that he doesn't bother to give any specifics. The same question that Michael Aaron talked about earlier on, he doesn't tell people what he will cut, how he is going to get this budget balanced, how he's going to lower property taxes. And in fact, he wants to turn away from the President Obama's recovery program, which will put property tax hikes on steroids. The fact is we have cut taxes very seriously in this administration, as well as the ones he wants to talk about, $7 billion of property tax rebates. Senior freeze expanded for 70,000 seniors, and an earned income tax credit for $300,000.

Michael Aaron, you're up next question for Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett, your property tax plan would, among other things, do away with homestead rebates. The governor and Mr. Christie both seem to believe in the rebate program. What do you know that they don't? The property tax rebate program is in a way a sham, because we send a bunch of our money down to Trenton, and they spend a time massaging it. We can tune about 25% of that money, and then send a portion of it back to people. What I'm giving you is a real property tax cut, a property tax cut of 25% to a maximum of $2,500, and it will guarantee that seniors get the full $2,500 cut, which is more than they get today under the tax rebate plan. So my plan talks about cutting corporate taxes for small businesses, which are the part of our economy, for large corporations, 25% property tax cut, and expands the sales tax to cover a wider range of services, which will primarily be paid by people in the upper middle income and upper income tax brackets who have a lot more disposable income. That's what this plan does. It's not raising taxes for a billion dollars. It's leavening out the system. It's making it fairer, more balanced, and it'll make New Jersey more competitive, and it'll make New Jersey more affordable than it's been in many years.

Mr. Christie, 30 second response. I think I just heard the governor say he cut taxes seriously in his four years. There are $9 billion in new taxes and fees since John Corzai became governor. The average property tax bill has gone up $1,000 since he become governor, and the average median salary has dropped $7,200 since he's been come governor. If he's the Corzai in squeeze, salaries going down, taxes going up. If he really sent out $7 billion in property tax relief, we should send some of our investigators out to try to find it. Time. Governor Corzai in response. Mr. Christie doesn't like the truth he makes up his own version. These Census Bureau just announced that New Jersey was one of the five states that actually had increased an income, median income last year. I don't really understand where those facts are coming. The property tax rebate, which had been eliminated in the year before I came through for many, many taxpayers, been increased to about $800 for people under $75,000. It was even larger at other times.

We've extended this senior freeze. We've provided earned income tax credit for working families up to 42,000. We've cut taxes to your bottle. I'm getting squeezed here in the middle. It's, I emphasize again, my plan gives a 25% tax property tax cut to all homeowners preserves the senior property tax freeze and guarantees that they'll get the full $2,500. It gives a corporate tax cut and it expands the sales tax to cover a wider range of services to make New Jersey more competitive, to make it more consistent with the economy of the 21st century, which is a more service-based economy, and ultimately to make New Jersey more affordable. Michael Aaron has a follow-up. The follow-up is to Mr. Christie, Mr. Christie to echo some of the state's commentators. Where's your property tax plan?

Michael, we've talked about it. We have to encourage shared services, regionalization, and consolidation, and the state has to get serious about doing that, not in a hand-handed way by ordering people to do it, but by sitting down and working together. The only way we're going to solve this problem is by doing that. There's no silver bullet plan. Four years ago, John Corzine promised a 40% increase in property tax rebates in four years, has not happened. The silver bullet plan, it's Christaggot that raises $4 billion in new taxes. They never wind up working. People are disappointed. This is going to be hard work. We have to sit down and do it together. Bob Engel has the next question, and it goes to Mr. Christie, Bob. The Corzine campaign says you have one set of rules for yourself, and another set of rules for everybody else. Is that true? No, it isn't. You know, over the last seven years, I followed one set of rules, and that's the federal law that I was charged with enforcing over the last seven years as United States Attorney. What the people saw was whether it was drug trafficking, or whether it was child pornography, whether it was human trafficking, or whether it was political corruption.

We enforce the law against Republicans and Democrats, North and South, regardless of where you come from in this state. People have seen that record and they know it. Over 130 Republicans and Democrats elected to appointed officials, sent to jail over the last seven years, a real fight against corruption in this state, and no enabling of corruption. Very clear, very clear choices were made, tough decisions were made, and we went after it. So there's no two sets of rules. The fact of the matter is the governor has decided to engage in a game of trivia here, and keep everybody entertained with his millions of dollars over the summer and ads. We were entertained too, but now it's October. And it's time to talk about the serious issues. I'm happy to stand by my record. Governor, your response? No, this misses the point when people talk about driving, when they talk about not reporting assets and not paying taxes, or giving out no bid contracts, $52 million to your former boss with no competition whatsoever, and then say you want a different example, or you're going to prosecute people for not reporting what is required or paying taxes. Then I think there is one set of rules for Mr. Christie and another set of rules for others, and I don't think that's the kind of example you want your governor to be laying down.

Mr. Daggett. I don't care about driving records. I don't care about loans and subordinates and girlfriends and neighbors and relatives. I don't care about any of that stuff. What I care about is the issues that are facing this state that we ought to step up and talk about seriously through the rest of this campaign, because we haven't talked about it enough. I'm the only one who's laid out specific programs, specific policies for every major issue facing us. I'm still waiting for the other people to do that. The only way you said an example is from the top. I will say an example, by the way I conduct my life, the way I have conducted my life to date, and by the way my driving records clean. Mr. Christie or a bottle. By the way, another time when Chris Daggett and I agree, I don't care about any of that stuff either, Chris. Seems like only a one person on this stage who does. The governor wants to talk about setting an example. Let's talk about a current one then. Today, Joe Ferrierro began his trial for corruption, for corrupting Bergen County, and Governor Corzine over the nine years he's been in public life has personally donated over half a million dollars to Joe Ferrierro. Someone who his co-defendant pled guilty just two days ago, is that the kind of example we're talking about setting, enabling corruption across this state with your own personal money? I don't think that's an example we need to be said.

Michael Aaron has the next question and it goes to Governor Corzine, Michael. When the attempt to improve urban education, your emphasis has been on preschool, which Mr. Christie says we can't afford to expand, and his emphasis has been on charter schools, vouchers, and school choice. Why do you prefer the pre-K approach? Well, first of all, I don't agree with all the premises. Certainly, preschool is the single most important reform, and it is getting results. Check out when you look at our test scores on fourth, third, fourth, eighth graders were closing the gaps for urban kids. You will see, if you look at a record, we have expanded the number of charter schools from 51 to 68. We've got nine more that we'll add next year. 14,000 kids go into 22,000 kids to probably 30 to 35 in the upcoming school year. We believe in charter schools and options, but what we need to do is make sure that our public schools everywhere are as successful as New Jersey's are in most places. We have the highest graduation rates, we have the best performing educational system in the country.

The greater demand colleges across the country, they score the highest on test scores and competition with kids across the country, and what we need to do is make sure we have that same result in our urban education, and we're getting that done. Mr. Daggett, your response. I have a doctorate in education, so I have a great passion for education. I went through the public school system here. My kids went through the public school system, but when our public school systems fail, we ought to make people account, and we ought to change things. The situation in urban areas is that we have a 50% dropout in a number of the high schools or greater. We have kids that the remaining kids only half of them pass the high school proficiency assessment test, and if they fail at three times, they take a pretty much a sham route that ends up with a diploma that indicates that they have got the skill, but they don't as it turns out. Mr. Christie, your response.

I once again agree with Mr. Daggett wholeheartedly in his assessment. One out of every 10 children who begin the first grade in the public school in the city of Camden, only one graduates from a public high school in Camden. 55% of the seniors at Central High School in Newark could not pass the graduation exam, even though it only requires an eighth grade reading proficiency. This is just not success. We're failing these children. These schools are failing, and the governor is a captive of the educational bureaucracy, and he won't bring change. We need to do better for these kids. Time. There are kids. Governor Corzine. We're putting more money into early childhood education, which Mr. Christie calls babysitting. It is changing the terms and conditions of all of our children that are going through the educational system. We're selling double-digit closure of our urban kids' performance on tests that compare across the state country, and we can make a huge difference. We're adding services after school, mentoring, and other issues. The issue isn't our teachers, and matter of fact, our teachers are among the best in the country, and we need to stand with them as opposed to criticize them. Governor, Mr. Christie keeps saying that your administration approved only one of 22 charter school applications last year. In recent days, your administration suddenly approved seven new applications and proposed easing the application process.

Does Mr. Christie deserve some credit for pushing you in that direction? I've been pushing charter schools long before I got into public life. I believe in charter schools. We've gone from 14,000 kids to 22,000 kids charter schools in my administration. A lot of the charter schools have expanded. It's not just new charters. It is actually expanding the number of charter schools. Mr. Christie likes to talk about the Robert Treat, which I've been involved with well before I even got into politics. They've extended their franchise. They've moved into the central war. Number of our charter schools are expanding year by year by year. I think that's a great thing. Cynthia Burton has the next question, and it goes to Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett, to cut rising costs, would you close the state pension system to new employees?

We would change it. We would make it a system that is based on, rather than a defined benefit system, we'd change it to a defined contribution system for new employees. But for current employees, as you know, there's a $30 billion gap, or an unfunded liability in our public employee pension system, or about 60 or 70 billion on the healthcare side. We need to figure out how to protect that system and get it financed properly. And the only way we're going to be able to do that, particularly given an $8 billion budget gap, is probably to ask our public employees, again, across the board. School teachers, municipal employees, county employees, state employees, all are going to have to contribute more to their pension benefits. They're going to have to contribute more to their healthcare benefits. They're going to have to probably take a round of salary cuts, or at least salary freezes, so we can get things more in line with the private sector, and we can make this state more affordable. Because right now, we can't afford the government that we have.

Mr. Christie, your response? Yes, Cindy, I've been saying that right from the beginning of the campaign, that for new employees excluding law enforcement, that they should have to go to a 401k type plan. You cannot continue to add people to a system that is in debt and careening towards bankruptcy, and expect that you're going to be able to close that gap. It simply does not work. So for new people, we need to go to a different route, and have them have a defined contribution 401k program. But we must keep faith with the people that are in that system now. They have made their plans for retirement based on that system, and my administration would keep faith with them. Governor, cosine your response? Well, for many, many years, Republicans and Democrats didn't put money into the pension system. I put more money in these four years that I've been governor than the last four governors combined into the pension system. We've raised the retirement age from 55 to 62. The last time the Republicans in charge, they lowered it from 60 to 55 increased benefits 9%. I kept the defined benefit at the social security level, and we put new requirements on people putting money into the system.

We can make it work if we manage it well, and we actually reform it a program. Mr. Daggett, your rebuttal. I actually agree with Governor Corzine that the Republicans and Democrats haven't done very well by the pension and benefit system for a long time now. But I also know, in my mind, Governor Corzine hasn't made the tough decision with respect to the employee unions that he needs to do in order to keep that system solvent. So we're going to have to do something dramatically different this time around, and we're going to have to hopefully work with people. And my approach is to save jobs and save the pension and healthcare benefit system without having to cut people or to have furloughs or anything else. But it's going to take people working together to do that. And we're going to take a short break now from the questioning by our panel of reporters. Don't go anywhere, gentlemen. To take questions from New Jerseyans gathered in the field by our NJN News team, the format will be the same for answering these questions with one difference. I'll ask a follow-up if I determine one is needed. Let's take a look at our first question.

I would ask them to please be as specific as they can be about how they plan to solve the state's structural deficit in the budget from one year to the next. And if it involves cuts, please be specific as to what kind of cuts you have in mind. And if it involves not being able to do tax increases, explain how you can manage that. Okay. This question goes to Mr. Christie. And could you hear the gentleman? That's good. Okay. Good. Thank you, Jim. A few things. First off, our state now in the last couple of years has spent over $185 million in health insurance for people who did not belong. In the state health insurance program, divorce spouses, other people who did not belong in the program, we spent over $185 million on that. Even the worst managed business in America wouldn't do that. But we're doing it here in New Jersey. We're spending money on it. We have to manage it better. It has not been managed well at all. Secondly, we spent over $250 million, a quarter of a billion dollars on overtime in the last year.

In a state workforce that continues not to have been subjected to any layoffs at all, we continue to have to spend over a quarter of a billion dollars in overtime. Again, a management failure by this administration. As I spoke about before, we need to keep spending reduced, even if we had kept it at the rate of inflation, we would have spent $5 billion less this year. And lastly, we can't have any more food and space programs. Smaller item in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, but where the course administration was paying someone who had already passed away. Time is a question. The state tax money. Governor Korzayn. Mr. Korzayn continues to talk about an eight-year program. I think I've been governor for four years. I'm not mistaken. And so, when you talk about all of these issues, you ought to focus on what is actual. We've done more to actually reduce the size of the workforce. 8400. It is saving hundreds of millions of dollars. We negotiated pension reforms that will save six and a half billion dollars.

We're continuing to look for every efficiency. And, matter of fact, we've closed departments. We've done all kinds of things that we're working to get even more done on efficiencies in that future response. The $8 billion budget gap is so big that you could fire every state worker and you still wouldn't have a balanced budget. And you could take all the waste fraud and abuse that you want to find and all the shared services that Mr. Christy talks about and you wouldn't balance the budget. We're going to have to do something a lot more dramatic than that to make this work. And my tax cut plan takes care of about a third of the budget problem that we talked about. The 8 billion freezing state spending will take care of about another third of it. We'll figure out in the spring now that once we have a better handle on what the economy is and we have a better handle on the state finances. Mr. Christy, you're a bottle. Sure. Let's talk about the last four years then. And let's talk about the fact that for every one government employee, there's 21 people in New Jersey. Do we really think we have a smaller workforce than we had before?

One government employee for every 21 people in this state. We have seen the governor walk away from concessions that he got at the table for political purposes. Giving away concessions that he got before on things like furlough days and salary deferrals and then giving them right back to the special interest in Trenton. That's not the way you fix this problem. Mr. Christy, I will ask a follow. Mr. Dagger, if I understood him right, and others have said that reducing over time and those types of endeavors are a small bore and they won't get to a structural deficit of $8 or $10 billion. What do you say to that? Well, first of all, I say they're wrong. And secondly, secondly, Mr. Dagger's solution is to raise taxes for billion dollars. And so we have a very clear choice in the stage. The governor's raised taxes $9 billion over the last four years. Mr. Dagger is now proposing raising taxes $4 billion during his term. We simply cannot afford this. The people of this state are suffocating under this tax burden. And we cannot add to it. It's the highest tax burden in America. And so they want to come up with all these other solutions that go back into the taxpayers' pockets. I simply won't do it.

Thank you. We have another question from the public, and can we roll that? My question would actually be to, since there is the migration out, what steps would you take as a candidate someone coming in in order to turn that around? What changes do you think would keep people inside or keep people in New Jersey as opposed to looking elsewhere for more affordable living conditions? And that question goes to you, governor. Well, the reality is, for instance, study show that we actually have growth in our population. There are some people moving out, there are some people moving in, and I suspect we will continue to see that. That's the normal turnover in a society, particularly in the northeastern states. We are growing economic opportunity for folks, just reported in the New York Times. We've got 1,600 jobs moving from New York City into Jersey City, Bayer Company, Unilever. All of our pharmaceutical companies and international footprint are expanding here in New Jersey. We're growing biotech jobs.

So I think once we get through this recession, and we've made a lot of changes in our corporate tax structure, net operating loss, carry forwards, tax incremental finance, there's a lot of technical things that we've done to make the business environment more favorable. I think we're creating an environment because we have great schools, we have a great transportation network, because people do well in New Jersey. I think they'll continue to come here. Mr. Daggett, a response? Somehow I've missed all that job growth because last time I looked unemployment in New Jersey was about 9.7%. The only way we can bring jobs to New Jersey and make the state more competitive is to make the tax system fairer, cut taxes, which is what I've proposed, property tax cut, corporate tax cut, income tax cut, share, I mean expand the sales tax to cover a broader array of services, make the system less dependent on the property tax. That's what it is, it's not a tax increase of Mr. Christie, keep trying to tell us because his math doesn't work.

Mr. Christie, here's the math, 10.7% top income tax rate in New Jersey, 3.05% in Pennsylvania, 10.7% John Corzides raised those rates to the third highest level in America. I don't understand how the governor doesn't see that people are leaving. People are leaving this state in droves, businesses are leaving in droves and taking their jobs with them, and that's why we have the worst unemployment rate we've had in 33 years. The governor has to step up and admit his economic policies have not worked, and we need to change course. Governor Corzides, Mr. Christie and Mr. Daggett both are pretending that somehow New Jersey is somehow suffering more than the nation or our global community with regard to economics. The fact is that we looked at the top 1%, 1.5% of New Jersey taxpayers, so that middle class and working families could avoid the kinds of tax increases so that we could continue to provide property tax rebates for middle income families. And that's exactly what our proposals are all about.

And if we continue to pretend that there is an economic crisis, the worst since the Great Depression, then we're going to have the kinds of results that I think people need to see. That's time. I will ask a follow up here as well. Is it true from what Mr. Christie is saying that at a rate of 10.7%, folks are crossing the bridge to states with 3.5%. Well, I just gave you an example of where people are crossing the bridge. They're coming from New York City into New Jersey. I told you about Bayer and Unilever, which both opened up their headquarters in the last 18 months in the state of New Jersey. One came from Connecticut, one came from Pennsylvania. There are going to be comings and goings. I know that if we leave it at 10.3 quarters, which is why we put it on on a temporary basis, it would hurt us with high income taxpayers. The fact is it will revert back to 8.97 at the end of this fiscal year. Time. Thank you. And we are now going to go to another question from the public. What are you doing for women's reproductive health care in New Jersey, especially reducing teenage pregnancy?

What would you like to see done? I'd like to see massive education campaigns and access to birth control so that our young women can stay away from motherhood until they're really ready and thereby improve their economic situation. And this question is for Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett? I agree with the questioner that we education is an important part of this, but I'm not quite sure that I understand that question enough in terms of it's certainly an education issue. Certainly we need to give kids and women the opportunity to choose what they want to do. I am pro-choice. I believe in women having the right to choose and make their own decision about what they do with respect to reproductive activities and with respect to if they have an unwanted pregnancy or even a wanted pregnancy. We need to have a better education system in place and we need to assist people hopefully to actually go to term and bear a child, but if they want to make a choice to do something different and to have an abortion, that's their choice.

Mr. Christie, your response. And listen, I understand the question. We need to make sure that we do everything we can to teach our children that sexual activity is not something that they should be engaged in until they're mature and ready enough for it. We need to start talking again about those values. I have two young daughters myself, 13 and 6, and we need to have parents more involved in this issue. We have to make sure that parents are notified about things that are important that are going on in their daughter's lives. That's the way we're going to do it by making families stronger and encouraging that kind of conversation in every household. Governor, of course, I'm response. This is a place where Mr. Christie and I totally disagree. I believe strongly in a woman's right to choose. I believe in Roe v Wade. I believe that our laws here in the state of New Jersey are reflective of a woman's right to choose. I believe strongly in prenatal advice and education. I do believe that abortion should be safe, legal and rare. But we need to make sure that the family planning characteristics that will make abortion.

We need to make sure that we have the right to choose. We need to make sure that we have the right to choose. Thank you. Let's go to our next question from the public. How much federal dollars are we getting that's going to help alleviate some of these because basically the city taxes are skyrocketing out of control. It's making a lot of people going to foreclosure and things of that nature. What are they actually going to do putting partisan politics aside to help with that? I'd like to know what they're going to do about the property tax problem in the state of New Jersey. Property taxes are way too high and I'd like to know what they're going to do to lower those or bring them into line.

Well, the bottom line is the taxes are too high. We have had road taxes for the past, I've lived in New, in cinnamon for 48 years. Every year we have road taxes, road taxes, road taxes. The roads in New Jersey are the worst in the country. The taxes in New Jersey are the highest in the country. It doesn't seem to me that the money that the taxpayers are putting out are going to where it's needed the most. I'd like to know what the policy is about taxes and what they're going to do about lowering them. All right, well, it wasn't one question. It was a series that we put together that skipped my mind, but of course it was mostly on taxes, property taxes, road taxes, other taxes. And this question goes, those questions go to Mr. Christie. Well, this is again where we see a clear difference on this stage. What you just saw on your TV is what I've been experiencing across the state of New Jersey's, I've been campaigning since February. People of all different ages and the regions of our state, understanding something that the governor seemingly doesn't, that the people of New Jersey are suffocated by these taxes.

We have to lower taxes in this state. And the way to do it is to lower spending. You know that in your own household. We have to spend less. And then we can tax less. So job one is going to be making sure that we get in there and we spend less money. And I will do it either through cooperating with the legislature and coming up with a plan that makes sense with them and getting their support. Or I will do it through using the line item veto and taking out every bit of excessive spending that's in there to get our budget in balance. So then we can lower income taxes, lower corporate business taxes to help create jobs. Those people are right. And Mr. Daggett and the governor are wrong on this issue. Well, I think you just heard why the star ledger says what Mr. Christie has to say about property taxes is a fantasy. This is a local issue, which the state can be a partner in helping solve, which is exactly what we've done. We've expanded the number of dollars for rebates by $2 billion, 35% over the last four years. We put a 4% cap, which we have sympathy with some of the efforts that Mr. Daggett is talking about.

We put new money in a school funding formula, first in 40 years, that actually is a major driver of property taxes. And we've got it down from seven and a half minutes. Mr. Daggett, response please. Mr. Christie, off left no plan. Mr. Corzine raising taxes. My plan is very specific. We're going to cut property taxes by 25% across the board. Corporate taxes cut 25% for small businesses and large businesses. We are going to expand the sales tax to cover that and that will be paid largely by people of upper middle and upper income levels. And that's how we're going to do this. We're going to make the system fairer, more balanced to make New Jersey more competitive and more affordable. We are going to cut tax. Mr. Christie, rebuttal. Listen to that very tricky language. By Mr. Daggett, he says he's going to expand the sales tax. His hand is in your pocket. That's what's happening. And listen to the governor. You know, is he not living here? Taxes have continually gone up in New Jersey over the last four years. Nine billion dollars in new taxes and fees under John Corzine. That is the fact. Highest tax burden in America under John Corzine. That's the fact. The way we will tax less is by spending less. That's the Christie plan.

Time. Thank you, Mr. Christie. We will now go to another public question. I would ask that there is currently a medical marijuana bill that is pending before the state legislature. And I would like to know what their individual opinions are and will they sign that bill? All right, governor Corzine. This will go to you. I did a little couple of calls on this one to pass the Senate medical marijuana. It's in the assembly, a health committee. They don't quite jive, but it's getting it's getting there. The gentleman's question. I'll sign the bill. Mr. Daggett. I want to see all the details of the bill, but I'm generally in favor of the bill as long as it can be targeted to the person who needs the medicine as long as it can be done responsibly so that it doesn't get into the wrong hands. But I also support the medical use of marijuana. Mr. Christie. I want to do whatever we can do legally and responsibly to alleviate the awful suffering from people who have awful diseases that are causing them great pain.

But given my law enforcement background, I also have to say that I agree with Mr. Daggett that devil and this is going to be in the details. We do know a lot of people who have a headache to be able to go and get medical marijuana where there is true pain and suffering that can be helped by this. I would be in favor of it. But there has to be sufficient legal safeguards to make sure we don't turn into California and everybody with a headache is going out and getting high. Governor Corzine, is there a rebuttal here? Yeah, if I had a headache it probably should be excluded from the reasons why people get medical marijuana. I suspect that it is the bills that I have seen and our council has counseled on have very strict restrictions and I'd sign the bill. And I will ask a follow up here of Mr. Christie you talked about the devil being in the details. There are details there. There's a senate bill that passed. There's an assembly bill that's come out of committee. Have you studied either the bills? Have you studied the details? What do you think of them? I've looked at the senate bill and I think it needs to be strengthened and I hope that the assembly will do that. I don't think there are sufficient safeguards right now in the senate bill.

But I think the rhetoric that I've heard from the people in the senate and folks in the assembly get the safeguards need to be strengthened more safeguards than what are in the bill now, Jim. And if they do that, then I would be I would be willing to sign a bill like that, but I they would have to be strengthened beyond where they are now. All right. We have another question from the public. Everybody that I spoke to in the construction business is very slow or going out of business. My question to him would be when did you think there's going to be a turn around? What are you going to do for more employment opportunities in the state of New Jersey? All right. We begin this round of questions with Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett. Unfortunately, a turnaround is anticipated to be a lot slower than anybody would hope. So it's not going to grow, the economy is not going to grow nearly as quickly as we would like. However, the only way in my mind that we can bring back this economy, attract jobs to New Jersey and retain the jobs that are here is by getting on top of the cost of government and by putting in place the tax plan that I'm talking about to make the system leveler, make it fairer.

And to be able to cut taxes, corporate taxes, property taxes, and some income taxes across the board so that we can make New Jersey more affordable and more competitive. Mr. Christie, your response? Listen, what that gentleman says is absolutely true. And the problem we have here is that unemployment in New Jersey is the highest that's been in 33 years. The governor mentioned earlier that we're pretending that there isn't a national economic recession. Mr. Daggett and I, we're not pretending, but the facts are it's worse in New Jersey than it is in the rest of the region. We have a higher unemployment rate than Connecticut and New York, a higher unemployment rate than Pennsylvania and Delaware. And the reason for that is just what Mr. Daggett said. It is the tax policies pursued by the Corzont administration that makes our state less competitive. Governor Corzont, we want to put the gentleman back to work and we're doing more than almost any state.

We have the single largest public construction project going on building a new tunnel under the Hudson River, $9 billion project going to be 6,000 people, $44,000 after the job is done. We have a school construction program going across the state that is putting people back to work. It's a clean energy program that is unmatched in the country. We've installed more solar panels than any state in the country other than California, more per capita, poor square mile. We are putting people back to work on infrastructure. Mr. Daggett, a rebuttal. We're putting people back to work, but it's slow and we need to make it so that this state is more attractive from a competitive and an affordable standpoint. We haven't done that in a long time under Republicans and under Democrats. They put us into a deep hole over the last 15 years or more with poor fiscal policies. My plan to cut property taxes and taxes across the board on the corporate side and some income taxes will start to make it more affordable and more competitive. It's not a lot of magic here. It can be done.

This is our final question from the public. How do they plan to help people that are uninsured, number one, and the people that for some reason just got laid off and don't have health coverage? Mr. Christie, that question is for you. This is what we were talking about earlier. 550,000 women in the state of New Jersey with no insurance at all, 1.4 million people without insurance, and in fact 100,000 more people without insurance than there were 8 years ago in New Jersey. The policies have been a failure. We need to make insurance for those folks more affordable. We need to allow out of state insurance companies to come in and compete for the insurance of those uninsured individuals to try to lower prices. We need to give them choice in terms of the kind of policies they want to attempt to make a policy affordable. We can't allow people to continue to go from emergency room to emergency room, getting the worst possible care because they don't have a regular doctor who can see them all the time, and then on top of it, it raises the cost to the state and charity care to an extent that is just simply unaffordable. We need to get more people insured, not less people insured, and the plan I've put out will get more people insured in New Jersey than are insured today.

Governor Corazon, response? Well, we have expanded the number of people insured last year by 150,000. It's an 11% growth, we're one of the leaders in the country. We have over 100,000 children that we've signed up under mandated health care for children. We've expanded the community health clinics for people who are without insurance by about 80% since I've been governor. We are working over and over again. Mr. Christie, again, says he wants out of state insurance companies that don't have mandates to come into the state of New Jersey and provide mandate free health coverage. Mr. Daggett, a response? I'm hopeful that the Congress will come up with a national health care plan at some point in time here. There's been a lot of debate about it, and hopefully they'll come to some agreement between the Republicans and the Democrats, and give us a health care proposal and a health care plan that expands the insured throughout this state as well as across the country.

It's shameful that we have so many uninsured people in this country, and we need to do something about it. I don't think that that debate is going to be on much longer. Hopefully we'll have something that we can all be proud of and be part of and agree on, but that's the first place that we're going to have to go to make Mr. Christie a rebuttal. Now, with these out of state insurance companies that are coming in and some of the issues that the governor has falsely raised about it, 49 out of the 50 states currently require coverage for mammograms. 49 out of the 50 states require a stay prescribed 48 hours stay for women after giving childbirth. These are not going to be mandate free, completely mandate free policies that are coming in. There'll be more affordable policies than the policies that are available in New Jersey right now, which has the highest health insurance costs in America. So when you do the research and you see, you know that he's just trying to scare people. Time, Mr. Christie. All right. We have just two more questions before we move back to our panel of reporters, and they'll come from your moderator here.

The first is for you, Governor Corazine. Governor, there's been some criticism from Mr. Christie this race over your hedge fund investment and TPG axons specifically. He maintains your breaking the law because the company has ties to casino interests. You say there's a firewall between that company and its parent. My question all that aside, why don't you just put your considerable wealth into a blind trust and be free of even any possible appearance of a conflict of interest? Not only is there not an issue, 22 states, including our regulatory agency here in New Jersey, have said that TPG axon is not because they haven't required them to register as a gaming operator. So this is one of those, if you don't like the truth, just make up your own version. The fact is, is that the time when we were talking about this, we turn around and find out Mr. Christie is invested in mutual funds and he suggests that that's a good thing because doesn't have anything once it's invested in mutual fund or a hedge fund. You don't have anything to do with what is going on with the investments, which is exactly what TPG axon is, a hedge fund, which I have no control over, no knowledge of what they're investing in and won't know except on quarterly reports if that's what I'm studying and since I'm trying to work for the families in the state of New Jersey on health care, on education, on the things that matter in their lives.

I don't have a lot of time to spend doing what, Mr. Christie, Mr. Daggett, a response. We need strong ethics laws in New Jersey and I've talked a lot about that in my campaign and on my website, you can see my thoughts on that. And we need to stop the corruption that occurs under the cover of law with all kinds of people trying to game the system and get to be part of the health care and pension benefits systems and putting in jeopardy, the full time employees, jobs and I'm excuse me, pension and health care benefits. But in the end, this issue about the governor's investments is a non-issue in my mind. It's another diversion from people talking about the issues that make the most difference to Mr. Daggett. Mr. Christie, a response.

I'll make this really clear when I'm elected governor on November 3rd, all my assets will go into a blind trust and so we won't even have to have this conversation or discussion. And I've laid out a very specific 10 point ethics plan that I laid out earlier this summer with great detail on things that we would change about what's going on in the state of New Jersey now. And I think all of you have watched me now over the last seven years as U.S. Attorney. We will enforce those laws and we will force them against Republicans, Democrats and Independence, Mr. Daggett, to make sure that everybody is covered under this program. Time Governor or a rebuttal? Mr. Christie has been in public office for the last seven or eight years. You know, if you were going to put it into a blind trust, I'm glad he's willing to do that going forward but that hasn't been the case in the past. I agree 100%. We ought to be talking about health care, how we're getting the next 100,000 children onto our family care program. We ought to be talking about how we're going to get more kids into preschool so that we can get performance in our urban education system. We ought to be talking about the property tax caps that Mr. Daggett proposed.

My next question goes to Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett, you're the independent candidate in this race raising the $340,000 necessary to qualify for public matching funds. The best showing, however, by an independent gubernatorial candidate in modern history in New Jersey was Murray Sabrin back in 1997. You might remember him when he ran for governor who got just 5% of the vote given that history. Are you in this to win or just to get some ideas into the process or as some have suggested to play the spoiler role? Do I look like I'm in this to play the spoiler role or not to win? Believe me, I'm in this to win. I believe that Democrats and Republicans in this state have not managed it well for the past 15 years or longer. I believe that people in New Jersey are looking for an alternative. I also believe that because independence far outnumber Democrats and Republicans in registration. And because I believe that people are willing to hear the truth finally about what's going on in New Jersey. And looking for someone will give them a responsible set of alternatives for how we're going to deal with the issues that face us.

I think people will gravitate toward me and they are. My numbers are in double digits now and remember this is a winner take all election. I don't need 50% plus one because there's a no runoff. I need to get one more vote than these two gentlemen and the other independents who are running. I can win this race with about 34% of the vote probably if it's an even split here between the three of us. I am sure that an independent is what New Jersey needs and I believe that the state of New Jersey voters believe it too. I agree with Mr. Daggett that over the last decade or more the Republicans and the Democrats have made a mess of what's gone on in Trenton. And I agree with Mr. Daggett that they need change but they do not need to change that Mr. Daggett is offering and they certainly don't need four more years of the same. Because as we listen to the governor we heard no plans about his vision for the future. We've heard nothing about what he's going to do going forward. What we have to do is reduce spending in this state. Then we have to lower taxes on both individuals, small business and large business time.

That's the regulation. That's what we'll do. Governor Corzana response. I think it's very positive Mr. Daggett's in the race. The fact is that he is actually putting down specific ideas talking about how we might move forward on the property tax issue. I don't have to agree with the proposal. I do believe that raising taxes at the degree that he is talking about during a time of recession doesn't make sense. But the fact is you have something to talk about. He's talking about caps which we have already put in place which is actually lowered the property tax rate from seven and a half percent down to three point seven. First time in ten years. I think it is a very positive addition to the debate. Mr. Daggett, rebuttal. Sounds like both these two guys might vote for me. Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats for the past 15 years have been responsible about how they've run government. I have over 30 years of experience of working across party lines, of bringing people together to solve difficult problems.

I know this state, I've given a lot of my life to this state and I know that I can win and that with the mandate of the voters of this state, we can make the changes necessary to fix this state and bring down taxes and make it more competitive. Time. Thank you. All right. We're now going to move back to a second round of questions from our panel of reporters. We begin again with NJN News Senior Political correspondent Michael Aaron who has a question from Mr. Christie. Michael? Thank you, Jim. Mr. Christie, let's talk about federal stimulus funds. You said you would reject funds that had unacceptable strings attached. But your campaign this week said you didn't mean the $2 billion in education money that came to New Jersey presumably with strings attached. Would you accept federal stimulus funding for extending unemployment benefits and why not accept all the help we can get? Well, Michael, first, I think I just heard the governor saying in response to that last question in criticizing Mr. Daggett's plan that raising taxes during a recession doesn't make sense. Well, we were in a recession in June and the governor raised taxes by $1.2 billion on New Jersey.

So I just want you to remember the double talk that you hear in campaigns. He says that concerning Mr. Daggett's plan without any recognition of the fact that he did just the same thing. Now, on federal stimulus money, let's be clear about exactly what I said. If it caused an expansion of a current program where we would not have the money to pay for that program, that's the stimulus money wouldn't accept. The education money did not fit that role. There really of that $3 billion or so we got. We're only talking about about $200 million that I would have rejected because it would have caused us to have a statutory change that would have increased the amount. We would have paid down the road without a guarantee from the federal government that would have paid for it. That's responsible. Time. Governor Corzano, response. Mr. Christy, once again, if he doesn't like the truth, he makes up his own version. I just said in the proportion or the degree that Mr. Daggett suggested in his plan, not that you would not raise taxes, you have to balance the budget. That's the requirement. That's what the Constitution says.

You can't walk away from them. So the fact is you have to do those things that are necessary. I can't understand what anybody would be thinking about not taking $17.5 billion to get our economy back on its feet. President Obama has done everything to work with us to get our economy moving, turning down those monies as ridiculous. Mr. Daggett, 30-second response. We needed a stimulus package, but it should have been targeted, timely, and temporary. And the problem is that there was too much pork associated with that stimulus bill that came out of Congress. What we have to guard against most is to use some of that stimulus money for the operational costs of the budget of government. And in New Jersey, of that $8 billion budget gap next year, 1.6 of it is stimulus money that won't be coming in that was being used for operational costs. We're not going to have to figure out how to deal with it. So we do need stimulus money, but it needs to be targeted, and not for operation. Mr. Christie, a rebuttal.

Michael, you want to know why I have an $8 billion deficit? It's because of the thinking of people like Governor Corzai. Why not take all the money? Who cares if it's going to come back next year? We'll worry about that next year after I get through re-election. I said I wouldn't accept $200 million out of $3 billion. But let me tell you what the governor's done. And Chris Dagon is exactly right. A billion dollars of K-12 education spending is stimulus money that's not recurring next year. I'd like to know from the governor where he's going to find that billion dollars so that we don't have to cut K-12 education. That's irresponsible budgeting, and that's why we are off the tracks. Time, Mr. Christie, and Michael Aaron, has a follow-up. I'd like to use my follow-up to ask the governor to respond to something Mr. Christie said five minutes ago. He said we've heard no plans for your vision of the future. We have heard a lot more from him about what he would do in the next four years than we've heard from you. What would you do in the next four years? We're doing more on shared services and consolidations than any governor ever has. You know that we close 26 school districts that don't have children attending those districts. We have an enormous number of projects going on between counties and municipalities.

Another vote is coming up in Princeton, Burrow and Princeton Township because we're stimulating that kind of effort with caps and also investing positive incentives to do it. We're going to make sure that we're educating our kids. The new school funding formula will be funded. Thank you. Next question comes from Cynthia Burton of the Philadelphia Inquirer and it goes to you, Governor. Cynthia? Governor, of course. And you say that you instituted the first economic stimulus program in the nation and you advised President Obama on his national stimulus plan. If we had the first in the nation, why are unemployment rates the highest in the region? How you cut up the region, by the way, New York City, which is 9 million people or 8.5 million people right next door to us, has about 6 or 7.10s higher. And I think you know Philadelphia has got a slightly higher unemployment rate. So, you know, it depends on how you look at who your comparisons are.

We've been below the national average 22 out of 24 months. We have growing incomes in this state. Our median income went up one of the few states in the nation this year. We have foreclosure rates that are one third lower than the national average. Now, there are real problems in our national and global economy. They were brought on by the kinds of fiscal policies that you hear Mr. Christie advocate cutting taxes for insurance companies, big business. And the wealthy is just exactly how we got into this mess. It is inthinkable that we ought to bring those kinds of policies to the state of New Jersey. Now, it's not very specific about it. But cutting taxes on insurance companies, big business and the wealthy is the wrong action. Mr. Daggett, a response. Democrats, tax and spend, Republicans borrow and spend. What's the common denominator? Spend. And that's what we've done too much of in the last 15 years under both Democrats and Republicans. It's time that we stopped that.

And we've got to do it along the lines of the kind of plan I've put forward to cut property taxes, cut corporate taxes, cut some of the income taxes. And by expanding the sales tax, make this a fairer system and a more balanced system. That's how we're going to fix this state. That's what we need to do time. Mr. Christie. Listen, the governor has so little experience cutting taxes that he doesn't even understand what we're talking about. We talked about cutting income taxes across the board for every New Jersey. Not just the privileged few or the other privileged few, but for all of them. And what the governor doesn't recognize by this top 10.7% rate is that that applies to small businesses also. And it's destroying jobs. That is what's going on in New Jersey. He needs to get on the ground in New Jersey and listen to people. And hear what's happening. It is our tax policy that is stifling jobs and why Cynthia are unemployment rate is higher than any other state in the region. That's why. The governor of course on rebuttal. Mr. Christie obviously doesn't know that we put that tax on for one year. Temporary tax comes off, goes back to 8.97.

I'm sure he will suggest that, oh sure, you're going to redo it. Our point is we have to balance the budget. We have a constitutional requirement, constitutional requirement to balance expenditures and revenues. Just like Mr. Daggett is proposing that you have to raise sales taxes, which actually go on the middle class and working families much more heavily. Time goes one and a half percent of the people at the top end of the rate. Cynthia has a follow, Cynthia. Governor, the state's unemployment figures keep going up. But your administration has said that there are some trends inside those numbers that should make us all feel good. Can you explain why your administration feels that way? First of all, I don't think anybody can feel good when unemployment numbers are going up when unemployment is what it is at the level. Whether it's the nation or across the globe. But we have seen private sector growth for two months in a row. It was very slow declines the previous two months.

And what we've seen actually is fall off in public sector growth. Unemployment is going up in the public sector because we've had a hiring freeze and some of the local communities across the state are doing. Time, Governor. The same. The first thing comes from Bob Engel of Connecticut, New Jersey, and it goes to Mr. Daggett, Bob. Mr. Daggett, what's your opposition on same-sex marriage? I've said that if the bill passes the legislature, I would sign that bill. But I want to go back to one other point. I can't seem to get everybody here to understand. Maybe Mr. Christie and Mr. Corzion haven't read my tax plan yet. But I am not raising the sales tax. It will stay at seven percent. If we expand it to a broader array of services, then are now covered. And those services or services used largely by people with much more disposable income than middle income families and taxpayers have. So it's going to fall largely on the upper side of the income bracket.

So in the end, I'm expanding those services to be able to cover that property tax cut, corporate tax cut, and some income tax cuts. That's the way we're going to make New Jersey more competitive. That's the way we're going to make New Jersey more affordable. And that's what I think almost everybody in New Jersey has been asking for for at least ten years. Mr. Christie, a response? Well, I believe New Jersey's civil union law is good, and it's working, and I don't believe we need to change it. And I do not support same-sex marriage. I've said that before, and I repeat it tonight, I believe marriage should be between one man and one woman. And I would not sign a bill if it came to my desk having same-sex marriage. I've read your plan, by the way, Chris. And it does raise taxes for a billion dollars. And I know that it also raises it on shore rentals. Now, let's think about what's going to happen when you start to destroy the shore rental business in the Jersey shore and what that's going to do to our time. Because you put a hat on it. Governor Corzano, response? I will sign the marriage equality bill that is working its way through the legislature.

Very straightforward. Commitment to equality under the law. All men and women are created equal. I think that's the process that were the principle that all Americans understand. And that is exactly what's at stake here. The civil union's law already provides for that. And this is the issue of what you label it. Mr. Daggett or a bottle? Got to go back to shore rentals. Yes, it's going to increase the, or put a sales tax on condominiums and homes. The hotel motel tax right now is 7%. And it's not put on other people. So it's unfair for the people in the hotel motel industry. And we're going to use the money from that to put a permanent source of funding for open space, which we haven't done. We're going to improve the tourism budget so that we can have more promotion for tourism at the shore, which is the heart of our economy. And we're going to talk to use the next question.

The money on responsible fashion. And Cynthia, your question is for Mr. Christie. Mr. Christie, you said that you support charter schools and vouchers. But I'm wondering, how are you going to make sure the kids in those alternative learning situations are getting a better education than they're getting in the public schools? What sort of oversight will we see? Well, Cynthia, first of all, we'll have a Department of Education that doesn't put hurdles up in front of those people who are trying to establish charter schools, which is why you've seen the dismal growth in charter schools you've seen, despite the fact that thousands of children are on waiting lists in our urban areas for charter schools, thousands of children are on those waiting lists, and the course on administration drags their feet on it. So we'll have a Commissioner of Education who will be partners with the charter school movement, who will say to people in charter schools, we will be your partners in helping you to establish them, and we will be your partners in making sure that you are providing a quality education. But if you look at the Robert Treet Academy in New York, the Learning Academy in Jersey City, these are places that I've visited, and that are doing extraordinary things well beyond what the state achievements are, you know, across our entire state, public and private schools.

They are providing a fabulous education, and by the way, they're doing it at a significantly lesser cost than what's being spent in the public schools in those same cities. And so I don't understand why you wouldn't want to do this unless you were a captive of the educational bureaucracy, who wants to keep the status quo. Governor, of course, on a 30-second response. Let's get it straight, folks. I believe in charter schools, we're expanding them. We went from 14,000 kids to 22,000. We need to make sure that all charters are quality charters. If they were all Robert Treet's academies, we would be signing off on charter applications over and over again. But I'll tell you one thing I don't agree with. And that is vouchers and draining resources from the public system that will undermine not only our ability to finance charters, but also our ability to finance our regular traditional public school system. Mr. Daggett, response? I think the question was, how can we assure that those kids get a good education? Something like, I forget what the number is, but 25 or so charter schools have closed because they didn't do the job necessary.

Likewise, we ought to close public schools if they're not doing the job necessary, or at least figure out how we can replicate the success of some of our best urban schools in those areas that are failing now. So one way or another, we've got to expand charters and then stay on top of them and make sure the kids are performing. But we ought to do the same thing in our public schools, and we ought to make sure that we don't let any kid fall by the wayside. Mr. Chris, do you have a bottle? Let's make this really clear. I'm for vouchers in school districts that are failing. And the governor says he's opposed to that, he'd rather continue to send those children to failing public schools while he fiddles and waits to fix the failing urban public school system. Well, those parents can't wait. These are the only children they have. They are their most precious possessions, and they want them to get an education now. And that's why African American and Hispanic American parents in these cities are saying they want choice, they want competition, and they want innovation. Time. Thank you, Mr. Christie.

Thank you, gentlemen. We are ticking now, down now, to the final minutes of our debate. So we will end our panel of reporters, questions there, and move to closing statements. Each candidate has one minute. We begin with Mr. Daggett. Mr. Daggett. This is an important election for New Jersey. Maybe the most important in our lifetime. I don't have to tell you that our system is broken and that Republican and Democratic parties are to blame. In your heart, you already know that. Only independent leadership can fix New Jersey's problems and make government work for you again. As an independent governor, I can appoint the best person for each job without regard to party ideology or loyalty. Ours is the one campaign that's told you the truth about what's going on in New Jersey. Ours is the only campaign that's provided you with specifics about what I will do when I'm governor, including a detailed tax cut plan, property tax cut plan that will take effect not in four to eight years, but now. We've run a very positive campaign.

We've tried to do everything we can to earn your vote. But now Democrats and Republicans are trying to scare you into believing that an independent can't win or can't govern. You know that's not true. Only an independent can do what is necessary to fix this state. On November 3rd, please join me and vote as an independent for governor, Chris Daggett. Thank you very much. Governor, cores on your closing statement. Thank you. On things that matter for the families of New Jersey, I stand with them. I stand to make sure that there is an economic recovery. That's why I work with President Obama to shape an economic recovery plan. That's why we had the first in the nation. That's why we're pushing ahead and growing private sector jobs. On Mr. Christie's behalf, he would have turned down. He says now 200 million, much as 5 billion according to independent analysts. On health care, we are expanding by 100,000, the number of children that have family care. And we've expanded overall health care for all of our citizens in New Jersey. Mr. Christie would cut the quality of health care by accepting mandate-free insurance policies.

Cutting opportunities both for mammograms and 48 hours stays and others. We have worked to make sure that our educational system continues to be the best. We're closing the learning gaps on our urban children. We are making sure that charter schools as well as early childhood education are invested in. On the things that matter, I will help make our families better in the state of New Jersey. And Mr. Christie, your closing statement. 9.7% unemployment, the highest in New Jersey in 33 years, and the worst in the region. The highest tax burden in America on each and every New Jersey citizen. The highest property taxes in America, going up over $1,000 on average per household in the last four years. 200,000 jobs now nearly lost nearly 200,000 just this year. New Jersey is in crisis.

We are in crisis because we are taxed too much because we spend too much and because we borrow too much. But you know, hope can be real again in New Jersey. If we have a governor who will come in and make the tough choices to cut spending, hope can be real again. If we cut income taxes across the board for everyone to cut business taxes. Hope can be real again if we restore New Jersey to pride and prosperity. I want and need your vote on November 3rd. I will restore your hope, faith, and trust in our government. Thank you. And that concludes NJN's campaign 2009 New Jersey gubernatorial debate. We'd like to thank the three candidates, our panel of reporters, the public questioners, our audience here in Studio D and you there at home. Now if you'd like to hear more on the debate with live insights and analysis from a panel led by NJN News Senior Political correspondent Michael Aaron, stay right here with NJN. Scoring the gubernatorial debate is up next. I'm Jim Hooker from all of us here at NJN News. Thanks for watching. Good night.

Funding in support of this NJN Public Affairs special has been provided by AT&T. Liberty Natural Gas. New Jersey Restaurants Association. New Jersey's Union Mason Recontractors. Sun National Bank. New Jersey Carpenter Contractor Trust. U.S. Screen Building Council. New Jersey Chapter. And by New Jersey Manufacturers Insurance Company. New Jersey.

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